There’s always been a strong LGBTQ+ draw to the world of fright, and it’s really not difficult to see why. Horror, at its very core, is a genre of “otherness.” Often celebrating, venerating, or putting on display the plight of the outsider, horror creates a narrative that those who exist outside of the mainstream can easily identify.

“I’ve been a fan of horror since I was very young,” recalls Erlinger Óttar Thoroddsen, director of the Icelandic horror film, Rift. “I remember being six or seven years old, being at the video store and browsing the horror section. I wasn’t allowed to rent those movies, so I’d make up stories in my mind of what they were about based on the cover art.”

It’s not every day that you see a gay-themed horror film, particularly not one which is expressly ravishing and has stunning cinematography. Although there is plenty of homosexual subtext in some of the greatest horror classics, and even in the more recently produced sequels, having a slow-burning thriller which keeps you on the edge of your seat and is also centered on gay men is a rather new and lavishly entertaining addition on the big screen.